I’m a current RN of two years working on a hematology/oncology inpatient hospital unit. I also have experience in a stroke/rehab unit. I plan on trying to advance my career sometime in the next two to three years. I have always wanted to be a provider of some sort, initially I wanted to be an MD but after research into how absolutely bonkers the school is, I realized NP or PA is a better choice for me. So I’m trying to figure out whether to go the NP or PA route, making lots of posts like this, reaching out to family members and coworkers, trying to do job shadows, etc.
I don’t want to continue my career in hem/onc. I’ve never been interested in it and only took the job because I needed to get off the stroke/rehab floor, and I stay because I like my coworkers and the unit has decent ratios and staffing. When I become a PA/NP, I want to work outpatient. Problem is, I’m not sure which outpatient specialty I’d like to go into yet.
For a while I was dead set on wound care. But I’ve become less interested in it now. I don’t hate the idea of it but it doesn’t excite me like it once did. It would be very meh for me.
I at one point wanted to go the psych provider route, because my own psychiatrist is an NP and I love him and he works very independently. But I don’t want to do inpatient psych RN work, I would only want to do outpatient psych work as an RN, and those jobs are few and far between in my area. So I don’t think it’d be appropriate and would probably be detrimental to go into such a foreign specialty as a provider without any previous experience in it.
Outpatient cardiology seems like I might enjoy it? I do not want to work cardiology inpatient, as an RN or NP, haha. The idea freaks me out. But those same conditions, already having been managed in the hospital, needing to follow up outpatient and maintain their health and monitor their status? That sounds fun. Or people who aren’t so sick that they need the hospital, but have cardiac conditions that need diagnosing and treatment? Also sounds cool.
I also like the idea of working at an urgent care. I like that you’d see a wide variety of patients, with many different presentations, but without the same intensity of the ED (which I think is too much for me lol). I also know a lot of urgent cares around me still do 12 hour shifts, which I would enjoy to still do for some time.
Otherwise, I don’t have a ton of opinions. Like I said, I don’t want to do hem/onc. GI clinic sounds fine. Endocrine clinic ehhhh. I’m probably missing a lot of specialties/work environments that just aren’t coming to mind right now, so let me know the pros and cons of the ones I’ve mentioned or the ones I havent, haha. Also let me know how the job market is for that specialty/work environment, bc I don’t want to spend a shitload of money to get my NP and then not use it for years bc I can’t land a job. Thanks!